"I'm getting off at the right stop, apparently," I sighed. "Okay, Farley, no evasions. In plain figures, how much drinking alcohol do we have left?"
The quartermaster slumped a bit. "Twenty-one liters unbroken. One more about half full."
"Half full? How did that ever happen? I mean you had some left? We'll take this up later. I want you to run it through the synthesizer to get some light wine...."
"Light wine?" Farley looked in pain. "Not whiskey, brandy, beer?"
"Light wine. Then ration it out to some of the men."
"Ration it to the men!"
"That's an accurate interpretation of my orders."
"But, sir," Farley protested, "you don't give alcohol to the crew in the middle of a mission. It's not done. What reason can you have?"
"To sharpen their taste and olfactory senses. We can turn up or block out sound. We can use radar to extend our sight, but the Space Service hasn't yet developed anything to make spacemen taste or smell better."
"They are going to smell like a herd of winos," Farley said. "I don't like to think how they would taste."